


Like Having Friends

by HitanTenshi



Category: Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, Naruto
Genre: Friendship, M/M, Pre-Boruto: Naruto the Movie, established hatake kakashi/umino iruka, innocent attraction, kai is my hc for the hatake child from the boruto anime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-11 12:27:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11148405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HitanTenshi/pseuds/HitanTenshi
Summary: Kai is almost as unsocial as Kakashi before him. Mitsuki decides to do something about it.





	Like Having Friends

“And then! And then! Then I smashed into the demon lord’s castle and wasted him! Mua-ha-ha-ha!”

“With a laugh like that,” Shikadai drawls, “You could play the demon lord in the sequel.”

“Oi! There’s nothing wrong with having an evil laugh! It’ll just make my enemies fear me!!”

“Like I said.”

“Just one of your many obnoxious traits,” trills Inojin, as cheerfully as if he’d just delivered a flowery compliment.

“I like his laugh.”

“I’ll just bet you do, Mitsuki~”

“You wanna fight, Ino?” Boruto growls, but rather than have his hands in fists, he carries a handheld gaming device, as does Inojin.

“Bring it on. I’ll flatten you, and do it _elegantly_ , too.”

“What a pain…”

It’s the usual sort of afternoon for that lot, stopping by a fast food place on their way home from D-rank missions. In earlier years, it had just been Boruto and Shikadai, about as inseparable as their fathers. Then, once they had started school, Inojin had smiled his way in (in spite of his acerbic commentary), and then Mitsuki had transferred from Otogakure and made it his personal mission to stick to Boruto like glue even more than Shikadai already had. In short, the group is increasingly thick as thieves, and they clearly don’t need a fifth wheel — proverbially, because Metal Lee _does_ become their fifth on occasion, but he is too devoted to his training to warrant much time for playing games.

Several tables away, as if having an inadequate measure of distance between themselves and the boys would sully them, sit Sarada and Chouchou, the former with her typical expression of exasperated resignation and the latter with her mouth full of the latest exotic flavor of potato chips. Chouchou goes on about her personal rankings of the boys with potential in both skill and looks in their class’s genin teams and Sarada listens patiently, giving her thoughts here or there where warranted.

All of them are special, the children of great heroes from the Fourth Shinobi War. At some level, he’s supposed to have that in common with them, except… well… what they have in blood, he has only in bond.

Kai had been an orphaned survivor from an attack on a small village by rogue ninja; he would have died with his family if Hatake Kakashi, then the Rokudaime Hokage, hadn’t snatched him out of the smoldering remains of his home. At least, that’s what he’s been told, but he had been only an infant at the time. His home with Kakashi, and with Kakashi’s spouse, Umino Iruka, is the only home he’s ever known. And yet, it isn’t home _enough_ for him to feel like he has any place with these other legacy-bearers. Compared to them, he’s just a stand-in because Kakashi had refused to produce an heir of his own blood. And, though Kai tries his hardest to be worthy of the name Hatake, to mimic Kakashi in every respect, it still hasn’t been enough. Kakashi had reached the rank of jounin by this age, and here he is: barely a genin. Even if assurance after assurance from Kakashi himself that Kai should enjoy his childhood has kept him from feeling a disappointment to his adoptive parents, that doesn’t stop the rest of the village from murmuring. A bunch of greedy gossips, ninja are. A comment of comparison here, a look of expectation there — these things build up. Perhaps Boruto, who is practically his cousin, could understand, but Boruto has this policy about not hanging out with him much at school because of this very fact. So here Kai sits, in a corner booth equally distant from Sarada’s and Boruto’s respective tables, not sure what he’s even doing here. Iruka had give him an unofficial mission to socialize more — something about emotional health that Kai thinks ought to be on the back-burner for a ninja — but he hasn’t the first clue what he ought to do. With a little sigh, he pulls out a book with an _Icha Icha_ cover (granted, this is only due to a transformation jutsu: he hasn’t been able to grab the real thing, since Iruka had put this crafty barrier seal on Kakashi’s prized collection so that the pages stick together if anyone under eighteen tries to read them) and picks up his place. Once he’s sat here for the required amount of time by his _“mission,”_ he’ll drop a report into Iruka’s office at the Academy and then go home. Maybe he can finally convince Kakashi to teach him Raikiri.

“Is that good?” a sweet voice asks from the other side of his book. When Kai glances up, he finds the mysterious Mitsuki standing there. “If the Rokudaime Hokage spends much of his free time with that series, it must be worth reading.” Kai doesn’t hear a drop of judgment in that voice, but that doesn’t stop him from frowning behind his mask.

“Don’t know,” he says, mimicking Kakashi’s laze, and he lifts the jutsu from off his book to reveal its true identity: _Increasing Your Chakra: A Guide of Meditations and Training Exercises_.

Mitsuki’s eyes curl at the edges the way Kakashi’s do when he smiles out of polite social expectations. “You’re very studious.” Kai just shrugs, then returns his eyes to his book.

“You bear some resemblance to your father.” Again, Kai senses that Mitsuki means no harm in the comment, but it brushes nerves nonetheless. After all, Mitsuki didn’t grow up here; he doesn’t know Kai’s background. Kakashi and Iruka hadn’t spread around the truth of the circumstances, outside of the Uzumaki and other close friends. Plus, it doesn’t help that Kakashi seems to like giving a different answer to everyone else whenever they ask, all of them complete falsehoods. Most of said stories seem to imply, by some ridiculous stretch of the imagination, that he is Kakashi and Iruka’s actual child. Maybe that’s just Kakashi’s way of saying it doesn’t matter where Kai had come from (or maybe he just likes to watch Iruka’s face go red whenever he hints that Iruka had taken on the role of mother) because he’s their child now. However good Kakashi’s intentions, when Kai had been younger, these tales had made him the local weirdo, Hokage’s son or not. It had been around that time that Kai had started wearing a mask like Kakashi’s, if only to hide the burn scars from the tragedy of his infancy that would get him bullied all the more. The abnormal normalcy of following in Kakashi’s footsteps is Kai’s only harbor, and Mitsuki has just sent an uncomfortable breeze his way.

“Kakashi says I look more like Iruka,” is his dry and cynical answer.

Mitsuki laughs into his hand at that, and it’s a light, genuine sound. “My parents say much the same, whenever we see each other. Each one insists that my brother and I look more like the other.”

That’s more than Kai has ever heard about Mitsuki’s family in two sentences. As a ninja, he finds himself at least _marginally_ intrigued. “Do they live in Otogakure?”

“More or less.” An obvious dodge, so he doesn’t expect for Mitsuki to follow that up with, “I’m going home this weekend, actually, and my parents will be there. Would you like to come with me to meet them?”

Kai can easily picture Iruka offering thanks to every Hatake ancestor for answering his prayers in a friend for his son. Kai himself is… less enthused, but Mitsuki seems nice, in spite of his occasional faux pas. He tries harder than Inojin does, at least. “Won’t Boruto miss you?” he hears himself ask.

Mitsuki’s eyes crack open at that and flit to where the blond continues to sing his own praises of video game prowess. “That would be nice, wouldn’t it…”

Oh. Is _that_ the kind of play this is? Well, Kai can certain sympathize with being ignored, intentionally or otherwise, by Boruto, and that somehow makes the offer _much_ more appealing. So, he shrugs. “Sure, I’ll go with you.”

+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+

Mitsuki had conveniently forgotten to mention the part where Kakashi is going, too.

“Yo,” his father greets cheerfully, waving to Kai as the boy lands with a packed duffel bag slung across his shoulders.

“Chichiyo,” and Kai keeps his voice on the polite side of clipped, “you could have mentioned this at breakfast.”

“Maa, that would have spoiled the surprise.”

“Does Otousan know about this?” but he already knows the answer. However much _Icha Icha_ he reads, Kakashi is the embodiment of loyalty and honesty when it comes to his relationship with Iruka.

“Iruka _insisted_ I go the moment he heard you were planning to leave the village for the weekend to stay with Mitsuki. I have some business with Mitsuki’s parents anyway, so it all works out.” Kai narrows his eyes in his peer’s direction at that, but Mitsuki just smiles. Sometimes, that kid really does resemble the moon in his name: pale and distant, yet luminous. Maybe that’s how he’d made friends with Boruto so quickly. “Right, then,” Kakashi breaks in, clapping Kai on the shoulder, “let’s have a good time, okay?”

Kai grumbles assent.

At least travelling on foot gives Kai a point of focus in each step, from branch to boulder to trunk to stream. There’s something relaxing about running, he finds, and he even applies a few of the techniques he’d been reading about to make sure he doesn’t get tired too quickly. The last thing he would want would be to feel like a burden to his father.

“Ah,” says Kakashi, breaking into Kai’s concentration at length, “we must be close.” Kai doesn’t get his meaning until Mitsuki pauses beside an outcropping in the rock face beside a low waterfall and bows to a tree planted adjacent… directly on top of gravel. Wait a minute…

“Kakashi-senpai,” says the tree, out of which grows a man’s face, then a man’s body wearing Konoha uniform.

“Hey, Yamato.” Kai has heard the name mentioned in some of his father’s tales of the past, but never met the man. As if latching onto his train of thought, Kakashi plants a hand on the top of his head and adds, “This is my kid, by the way.”

Yamato has very dark eyes that could set brave men’s knees knocking in fear if he looked at them too intently, but they are full of nothing but kindness as they drift to him. “It’s nice to meet you, Kai. Kakashi-senpai brags on you in our correspondences, so I feel like I already know you a little.”

“Maa, do I really?” Kakashi laughs, and Kai feels his face flush behind his mask, but not in an unpleasant way.

“Yamato-san,” asks Mitsuki, “is everyone inside already?”

“Mm? Oh, yes.” Yamato thumbs to a carved entrance, hidden in the shade of the outcropping and the waterfall. “Kabuto-san arrived about an hour ago.” _Wait…_ “He looked better than when I saw him last; I think Orochimaru’s treatments to reverse his transformation are going well.” _Wait just a second!_

“Mitsuki! Is that you?” a chilling, slithery sort of voice calls out from the darkness beyond the cavern entrance.

As cool as a cucumber, Mitsuki cups his hands around his mouth and calls back, “It is. I’m home!”

In a flurry of robes and dark hair, none other than Lord Orochimaru, one of the Legendary Sannin and once the bane of Konohagakure’s existence, wraps Mitsuki in the tightest hug Kai has ever seen and proceeds to nuzzle into his cheek with utter adoration. “Oh, how I _missed_ you, my precious child! You never come home often enough. Are you eating? You look as thin as ever, poor thing. I’ll ask your brother to whip up something extra nutritious, all right?”

Mitsuki holds up admirably well under this smothering display, whereas Kai just stands as rooted to the spot as Yamato’s tree, his eyes wide. Kakashi nudges him in the shoulder: a silent reminder that staring is rude (as if _he’s_ one to talk about social graces).

“Ah, Kakashi.” Orochimaru seems to have satisfied his parental urges for the time being. He straightens and shakes Kakashi’s hand, but then those slitted eyes shift to Kai. “And this is?”

“My son.”

“Ah, yes! He was so small the last time I saw him.”

Kai bows, but Orochimaru just laughs lightheartedly at the gesture. “No need to be so formal, Kai-kun. Any friend of Mitsuki’s, let alone a child of Kakashi’s, is welcome here.” And he ushers them inside, save for Yamato, who sticks to his post.

Yakushi Kabuto bears very little resemblance to what Kai would have expected, from all the tales he’s heard about the war. True, his skin still gives way to scales in places, and his eyes are golden like Orochimaru’s, but at least he doesn’t have a giant snake protruding from his gut. After a moment’s double-take, though, he puts two and two together and whispers to Mitsuki. “Is… he your other parent?”

“In a way,” answers Mitsuki. “Orochimaru-sama created my brother and me, but, since he used to be inside Kabuto, his genes were incorporated, too — with Kabuto’s permission, of course.” Pointing to himself, he explains further: “Apparently my brother and I bear an uncanny resemblance to one of Orochimaru-sama’s former hosts, from the time when he was stealing bodies. Technically, that means I have at least three parents.”

“Oh, uh… wow,” Kai answers intelligently. Thankfully, Mitsuki seems not the least bit perturbed.

Where resemblances go, though, the biggest shock by far comes from meeting Mitsuki’s elder brother (Orochimaru calls him Log at some point, but Kai isn’t sure if that’s his actual name or an inside joke). The two brothers look _so_ alike that Kai dares to wonder if they are clones from the same soup. Were it not for the fact that Log is much older, much coarser, and has a diagonal scar on one cheek, Kai wouldn’t be able to tell the two apart at all.

In the midst of this unexpected family, Kai is extremely glad for Kakashi’s company. Maybe that is exactly why Iruka had insisted that they go together. (He does tend to think of these things ahead of time.) At length, though, the adults go to discuss their business, leaving Kai and Mitsuki to their own devices.

“Are you glad that you came?”

Having been lost in processing the events of the day, Kai twitches upon being addressed, but, in spite of himself, nods. He can’t remember the last time he’d stayed at a friend’s house… it would rather have required having a friend in the first place. Mitsuki warms him with that smile full of moonlight again, and Kai fears his face grows a little hot. Maybe it’s because his own parents have gone against the grain, but, he’s never found himself against the idea of finding another boy attractive. Furthermore, Mitsuki had gone out of his way to include Kai, even to reveal the details of his unusual family situation to him. He really is very kind.

“…Thank you for inviting me.”

“I was happy to.” A mischievous glimmer then lights up the golden eyes. “Do you think Boruto will be jealous?”

If he chose to, Kai could take that to mean that he’d just been a pawn in Mitsuki’s plans (and to mean that Mitsuki already has his eye on Boruto in more ways than one), but he pushes the selfish thought aside and grins behind his mask. “If he isn’t, then he doesn’t know what he’s missing out on.”

“It’s like having friends, isn’t it,” and Mitsuki laughs lightly, the sound a tenor echo of Orochimaru’s, “sharing secrets.” When Kai nods, the moonlike boy leans in, angled eyes full of interest. “Why do you wear a mask?”

Defensively, Kai tugs the thing more securely up his face. That _is_ a secret, but, he supposes, it wouldn’t be fair to expect Mitsuki to spill his guts and not do some spilling of his own. In comparison to having Lord Orochimaru as a parent/creator, having some burns on his face doesn’t seem so daunting an oddity. So, with much fidgeting, Kai lowers the barrier between their faces. Mitsuki betrays no change in expression at first, but leans in silently. Finally, he looks up into Kai’s eyes, bright gold on dark blue, and whispers through a smile:

“I think this means we are truly friends now.”

Unsure how else he can reply to that, Kai nods, Mitsuki mere inches away now. That would unnerve him if he hadn’t braced himself somewhat for the other’s direct manner.

“I like your face,” says Mitsuki.

“…Like you like Boruto’s laugh?”

Mitsuki chuckles. “Something like that.” With a tilt of head, he asks, “May I touch it? Your face?”

Kai doesn’t expect his next nod to lead to not Mitsuki’s _hands_ touching his face… but his _lips_. It’s brief, so fast that Kai doesn’t fully register it until it’s passed, but the memory of Mitsuki’s kiss is like a flame to his scarred chin that reaches down into his heart with warmth.

“It’s not a bad thing to be different.”

His pale skin surely giving away a blush, Kai nods once more, at a loss for words. Untroubled, Mitsuki takes Kai’s hands in his and squeezes them. “Forget what Boruto will think. If you want to sit with us next time, then do. I’d like to get to know you better.”

“D..do you kiss everyone that you want to get to know better?” The question escapes him before he can think on it. Maybe the unexpected affection has addled his brain. Mitsuki only smiles all the more.

“Not everyone. You seemed like you could use it.”

That, naturally, makes Kai blush all the more. “Th..thank you.”

“What are friends for?”

Really, though, however unorthodox his methods, Mitsuki has just been kinder to him in the past twenty-four hours than the rest of their graduating class has been in the past month. Perhaps, Kai wonders as he pulls his mask back up into place and follows Mitsuki on a tour of Orochimaru’s hideout, he finally will have a reason to sit with the other boys, even if they do tend to devote their free time to defeating demon lords in video games.

**Author's Note:**

> imo if orochimaru has any secret plans at this point, they're for mitsuki to make every teenager in konoha rethink their budding sexuality


End file.
